


you destroy everything that you know

by calcelmo



Category: Cobra Kai (Web Series), Karate Kid (Movies)
Genre: Alcohol Abuse/Alcoholism, Drunken Confessions, Gen, Love/Hate, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-25
Updated: 2020-10-25
Packaged: 2021-03-09 01:34:07
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,064
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27195862
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/calcelmo/pseuds/calcelmo
Summary: Johnny takes a drive. Somehow, he always ends up in the same place.
Relationships: Daniel LaRusso/Johnny Lawrence
Comments: 11
Kudos: 93





	you destroy everything that you know

**Author's Note:**

> My dad and brother were watching Cobra Kai with each other and I glanced up to watch it for a few minutes, and realised this was the greatest pairing ever to grace television.
> 
> Please leave comments - then I might have the courage to take it off anon!
> 
> (Title from Flesh Without Blood by Grimes)
> 
> Edit: Taken off anon!

Johnny hates drinking. Hates being a drunk (because really, that's what he is, no matter how much concern he brushes off). But it's at times like these when he thanks God, thanks every deity known to man, that alcohol not only exists, but is readily available at all hours of the day.

He drinks so much he feels sick and then drinks a little more, less urgent now, letting small sips of vodka burn down his throat and fill his bloated stomach. The interior of the car spins, with the lights on the dash getting brighter by the second. If he moves, it tilts, and he feels a violent rush of nausea. 

He tries to stay as still as he can, not moving aside from the repetitive, reassuring movement of his elbow, arm, wrist and hand working in tandem to bring the glass to his mouth. 

Finally, he can breathe around the immovable parasite latched onto his heart. 

It takes him an unnaturally long time to register the silhouette at his window, obscured by sheets of pouring rain. The figure bangs his fists against the glass. 

_Hey,_ Johnny thinks, frowning. _That's. My car. Get off my car._

The guy outside yells something that sounds vaguely like _JOHNNYWHADINTHAHELARYADOININTHERE._

Johnny leans over to wind the window down, missing his aim at first, and finally, sluggishly succeeding. 

"Thfuck," he scowls. 

"Yeah!" Larusso repeats emphatically, nodding his head. "'The fuck' indeed. What's going on?" 

Smartass. "Can you go away?" 

"I-" LaRusso blinks at him. Johnny can't help the grin that slots into place, Lawrence one, LaRusso nil, catching the fucker by surprise. Then the guy frowns. "Sure I can," he says slowly. "But you're parked outside my house." 

Johnny scoffs. It comes out as a little weird and exaggerated. 

LaRusso opens the passenger side, uninvited, and sits down beside him. Johnny knows, even drunk, that those copper eyes are fixed earnestly on his face. 

"Why are you here?" 

LaRusso's voice is painfully gentle, edged with amusement, and fondness if Johnny was being truly honest. Which he isn't. He's still trying to hate him. He doesn't want whatever this is. He wants LaRusso to fight him so they can go back to simpler times, simpler feelings like anger and rivalry. 

He doesn't really know why he came, other than everything had just gotten to be too much. He saw LaRusso even when he closed his eyes. He heard him all the time, snarking and snapping in his head. 

"I'm thinking of giving up," Johnny answers, evasively. Too late he realizes the implication, and looks wonderingly down to see LaRusso's fingers clamped around his wrist. 

He turns his head, finds himself unable to look away. 

"What?" Daniel whispers. 

Johnny makes an abortive movement to take his hand back, twitching slightly, but he wills himself to keep still. He puts his glass in the cup holder, absently flipping LaRusso's hand over, palm up, so he can twine their fingers together. 

LaRusso says nothing. He squeezes Johnny's hand. 

"Everything I thought I..." 

It's immeasurably difficult to put it all into words, the swirling mass of emotions churning up the acid in his stomach, with the alcohol that numbs it all. 

Johnny sighs, swallows through his dry throat, and tries again. "I got nothing left now that I can't hate you." 

Daniel smiles. There's a wild, pleased spark in his eyes. He gets it. He gets what it's like when the only person in the world who understands you is also supposed to be your greatest enemy. 

But does he understand what it's like to need an enemy? He probably laughs at the concept, because he's gotten past the need for scapegoats and targets for untameable anger, because he's good, because he's whole. 

"You're my friend," Daniel says, unbearably honest and sweet. "And when you hit rock bottom, you need your friends. It happens to all of us, okay? You don't need to hate me. You just need to let me help you." 

Idealism and narcissism is a recipe for disaster, and Daniel is its walking result. He thinks there is a solution to everything, and that he's the one to find it. 

But the worst fucking thing is that he's often right. 

"Did something happen? Did you come here to talk?" 

Johnny stays silent _. I came here to goad you into hurting me. I came here to hit you until I'd stop thinking your face was pretty._

He runs the tip of his tongue against the backs of his teeth, trying to chase the last vestiges of liquid courage. He wonders what Daniel would taste like. If he'd punch him if he tried to find out. 

"Nothing feels right 'less you're there," he admits, slurring it on purpose as much as it's natural. The confession doesn't make him feel any lighter, doesn't take away the pressure in his chest. Still, he takes a savage joy in bringing a world of pain for Sober Johnny to wake up to. 

"Johnny..." Daniel shakes his head, trying to talk past his teeth chewing at his lip. Johnny's gaze snaps up to try and read him better, to begin the masochistic search for pity and disgust. 

There is none. Just that unfathomable fondness. 

Daniel puts his hand on the nape of Johnny's neck, pushing firmly through the strands of blond. He leans up and presses a kiss to Johnny's forehead. 

Johnny swallows. Then he swallows again, trying to crush down the rising tide of hopelessness, the rage that comes thick and fast under LaRusso's kiss, so benevolent, so patient and saintly and _fucking intolerable-_

This isn't a pure love, like LaRusso and his girl. This is the kind of love that always ends in a messy, one-sided heartbreak; when that desperate attachment can't be quieted any more, and you only confess because you'll die if you don't. 

"I'm going to be sick," he mumbles. 

Somehow, he gets himself out of the car and away from LaRusso's drive. The storm drains wash away vodka mixed with takeout leftovers. 

The car door slams. Footsteps follow. 

Johnny wishes the storm would wash him away too. 

LaRusso wraps one arm around his middle, and the other takes a handful of the hair plastered with sweat on Johnny's forehead and smooths it back, saying, "That's it. I got you." while Johnny pukes, and keeps saying it when he starts to cry.


End file.
